A Fascination With Destruction: The Enduring Appeal Of Guns N' Roses' Finest Hour

The year was 1987 and, for many, rock ‘n’ roll was truly fucked. The reason? A hairspray-soaked posse of posturing pretty boys who had set up shop with a commercially-charged, overproduced pop sound full of empty hedonistic abandon. Any notions of authenticity, rebellion and anarchy were superseded by a relentless desire to party hard and get laid. Until one band, and one record, woke everyone up.

Written by: Simon Ramsay | Date: Tuesday, 25 July 2017

Elvis Costello: Many Happy Returns To 'My Aim Is True'

Take a look at the songwriting credits on the Crazy World of Arthur Brown’s seminal 1968 single Fire and, alongside those of the bandleader and his co-conspirator, Vincent Crane,  you’ll find the names Mike Finesilver and Peter Ker. Less than a decade later, with the royalties from the record tucked in their pockets, the duo would turn four walls in north London into a den of punk creativity.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Monday, 24 July 2017

Play The Shitty Hits: Katie Von Schleicher's Ambitious Twist On Pop's Best Moves

Photo: Chris Baker You always feel a great pop song before you understand it. There’s a disconnect between a chorus that makes your heart swell, or a turn of phrase that makes tears well in your eyes, and the meticulous, sometimes sterile, process that helps transport a writer’s thoughts from the page to your turntable/phone/whatever. But Katie Von Schleicher finds magic on both sides of the equation.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Wednesday, 05 July 2017

Vampire Weekend's Baio: Bowie, Trump and Being a 'Man of the World'

“Bowie showed me what an album could be,” Chris Baio says. “When I was 18 I heard ‘Low’ for the first time. It’s full of these weird but tight pop songs like Breaking Glass - a song with a memorable chorus and a big guitar riff - and then on the back half you’ve got Warszawa - this very abstract, ambient piece of music. It all happens on the same record and it never seems contrived. It all makes sense.”

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Friday, 30 June 2017

Moving, Mutating, Surviving: Jehst Talks 'Billy Green is Dead'

Urban music and culture in the UK - whether that’s hip-hop, grime or any other format - has always by its very nature represented working class interests and struggle. It’s not surprising to see artists like Akala, Stormzy, Lowkey and Loyle Carner speaking out on incidents like the fire at Grenfell Tower or supporting anti-establishment figures like Jeremy Corbyn.  Nevertheless, this movement’s increased visibility on public forums has inevitably sparked wider interest: who are these soapbox or ‘political’ rappers?

Written by: Jonathan Rimmer | Date: Thursday, 29 June 2017

ABC: Many Happy Returns To 'The Lexicon of Love'

Last year finally saw the release of one of the most long-awaited sequels in musical history: ABC’s ‘The Lexicon of Love II’. The album landed almost 35 years on from the pop outfit’s landmark debut, echoing and rivalling the original.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Wednesday, 21 June 2017

Algiers: Communing With The Ghosts of Pop on 'The Underside of Power'

Photo: Dustin Condren Drop the needle on Aretha Franklin’s Young, Gifted and Black and you’ll also find yourself in the room with the song's composers, Nina Simone and Weldon Irvine, as well as its inspiration: the playwright Lorraine Hansberry. You’ll hear notes that accompanied the civil rights movement in America, words that rose in throats alongside spirituals and folk songs dating back decades. That’s pop music: a conversation between past and present. It’s the chance to commune with ghosts.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Tuesday, 20 June 2017

Radiohead's 'OK Computer' At 20: The Footprints of a Masterpiece

Twenty years ago, Radiohead put out the seminal ‘OK Computer’. The record is being reissued to mark the occasion, alongside assorted b-sides and rarities, while the band will soon headline Glastonbury, something they also did in the immediate aftermath of its arrival back in 1997.

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Friday, 16 June 2017

Fill In The Gaps: Anathema Evolve Further On 'The Optimist'

First impressions count for a lot in the music business. If an artist nails a marketable aesthetic on their debut, it can dictate the direction of their entire career. That perhaps explains why Liverpool collective Anathema aren’t recognised as one of the greatest alternative rock bands to come out of the UK in the last three decades.

Written by: Jonathan Rimmer | Date: Friday, 09 June 2017

Sad Girls To The Front: Introducing Kamikaze Girls

Kamikaze Girls want you to know something: it’s OK to be sad.

Written by: Laura Johnson | Date: Wednesday, 07 June 2017

Sad Songs and Serendipity: Introducing Jade Jackson

Photo: Xina Hamari Ness Sometimes our lives feel like a series of completely random experiences. Like a series of haphazard, unconnected dots we spend our time trying to arrange into a meaningful pattern. Then there are those magical moments when an intangible masterplan seems to be unfolding; when everything feels like it’s happening for a reason. Hailing from smalltown USA, specifically Santa Margarita, California, singer-songwriter Jade Jackson knows that feeling. For a while it’s seemed like the universe wants to make her a star.

Written by: Simon Ramsay | Date: Wednesday, 31 May 2017

EXCLUSIVE: Stream My Name Is Ian's New Album 'Cincinnati Cola'

My Name is Ian are set to release their latest album, 'Cincinnati Cola', on June 2 via Bubblewrap Records and you can stream the collection exclusively below.

Written by: Jennifer Geddes | Date: Tuesday, 30 May 2017

No Compromise: Employed To Serve Make Their Mark On 'The Warmth of a Dying Sun'

There’s a man wearing novelty cufflinks. He’s not actually reading the copy of the Financial Times in his lap, but his eyes are glazing over at the pictures. A woman has brought her entire house onto the train carriage like an urban hermit crab. Children are screaming. Someone’s shouting the details of a banterous night out with the lads down a phone. This is a daily commute. This is hell.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Thursday, 18 May 2017

If You Don't Gamble You Don't Win: Inglorious Aim For The Big Time

Ignoring the obvious quips about the importance of size, if we were to describe British rockers Inglorious in one word, then it would be ‘big’. Or maybe ‘massive’. Either way, both terms encapsulate their sound and what they aspire to become.

Written by: Simon Ramsay | Date: Tuesday, 16 May 2017

Duran Duran: Many Happy Returns To 'Rio'

When Duran Duran released their second album, ‘Rio’, in May of 1982, the power of the music video as a promotional tool had barely taken off. Aside from the legendary Queen video for Bohemian Rhapsody – put together in a matter of hours and subsequently aired on Top Of The Pops – the marketing possibilities had yet to be adequately explored, particularly in relation to sales.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Wednesday, 10 May 2017

The Devil Is In The Detail: The Rise And Rise of Zeal & Ardor

“We wanted to…how do you say it? Spit fire? When you take the special liquid, take the torch and blow on it. That. We did that with gasoline for a moped. Not really reflective stuff, just kinda dumb kid stuff. The shit you get into when you’re really bored, I guess.”

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Thursday, 27 April 2017

The Stranglers: Many Happy Returns To 'Rattus Norvegicus'

Great songwriting partnerships are scattered throughout the history of music in the UK. Most famously, of course, you have John Lennon and Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, whose compositions took on lives of their own beyond the confines of releases by the Beatles and Rolling Stones.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Monday, 24 April 2017

Have We Learned Nothing? Nine Inch Nails' 'Year Zero' A Decade On

Everything gets written down. Are you an optimistic person? What does the future look like? A decade ago, Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor pulled us aside and told us how things were going to go down. We would become sedate and pliable, he said. We would allow government control to become our norm. We would stop fighting back. He called this warning ‘Year Zero’.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Wednesday, 19 April 2017

The Smith Street Band: Wil Wagner And The Power Of Storytelling

The best stories don't travel directly from A to B. Often it’s the digressions and asides, the forays into deep background and analysis, that are the colour between the lines. That's true whether tales are told over a table stacked with empty glasses or read from a book with a cover plastered in pull quotes. The telling is every bit as important as the details. “Our stories, our books, our films are how we cope with the random trauma-inducing chaos of life as it plays,” is how Bruce Springsteen put it in his autobiography.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Wednesday, 12 April 2017

From The Outside Looking In: Dream Theater's Keyboard Wizard Talks 'Images And Words' And Beyond

When it comes to any artistic form, masterpiece is a word that should be reserved for works of true genius; those unique creative expressions that are pioneering, inspiring and timeless. Dream Theater’s hallowed sophomore record ‘Images and Words’ more than fits the bill, having birthed a legion of imitators by fusing metal riffage, melodic beauty and progressive experimentation together into a ball of virtuosity and emotion that’s as powerful today as it was in 1992.

Written by: Simon Ramsay | Date: Wednesday, 12 April 2017